Presidency of Martin O'Malley Wiki
Presidency of Martin O'Malley The United States Presidency of Martin O'Malley, also known as the O'Malley administration, was the executive branch of the federal government of the United States from January 20, 2017 to January 20, 2025. O'Malley was the Governor of Maryland from 2007 to 2015 and before that served as the 47th Mayor of Baltimore. He was elected the 45th President of the United States on November 8, 2016 following a competitive campaign between him and the Republican presidential nominee, Chris Christie. The O'Malley administration enjoyed a brief era of Democratic control of both the White House and Congress between 2017 and 2018. Following the midterm elections of 2018, however, the Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives and nearly gained control of the Senate. Despite the political challenges constantly faced throughout the administration, O'Malley was reelected in 2020, chiefly due to a growing economy and a mostly peaceful world. The administration retained a progressive record on social issues, but struggled to appease liberal Democrats on its fiscal policies. Often referred to as a "deficit hawk", President O'Malley managed to balance the federal budget by mid-2023 and maintained a surplus for the remainder of his presidency. O'Malley supported the Obama administration's health care reform law, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (often referred to as "Obamacare") and fully implemented it throughout his tenure. He manuevered through Congress a significant gun reform law, much to the chagrin of conservative Republicans, and made indicative steps towards eliminating capital punishment in the United States. Leaving office with a job approval rating of nearly 70%, President O'Malley retired as one of the nation's most popular presidents since modern polling began. Inaguration At the dawn of 2017, America witnessed its third consecutive inaguration of a Democratic president. President Barack Obama, who served eight years before O'Malley, was present at the swearing-in ceremony, as were former Presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George H.W. Bush (President Jimmy Carter had died of a heart attack only three months earlier). At the ceremony, 54-year-old President-elect Martin O'Malley took the oath of office, which was administered by Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Roberts. In his first speech to the nation as president, O'Malley spoke broadly and of timely topics. The speech lasted only eleven minutes, but clearly contained three recurring themes: fiscal responsibility, a new approach to foreign policy, and the Democratic domination that had taken place over the last decade. Many political pundits - mostly right-leaning - were surprised following the election of O'Malley, as they believed the liklihood of a third Democratic administration was close to zero. Furthermore, the growing unrest and unpopularity of Barack Obama had placed a significant burden on the Democratic presidential hopeful, Martin O'Malley. But Obama's shortcomings proved inconsiquential, as O'Malley was rightly elected with a slim majority in the Electoral College. The inaguration of President Martin O'Malley has been observed, however, as mostly a non-event. Present in the crowd were only about 450,000 onlookers, which pales in comparison to the one-million observers at the first inaguration of Barack Obama in 2009. At the conclusion of his speech, the new president made a bold promise to the nation that in four years, if he had failed to accomplish what he had set out to do, he would not seek reelection. His advisers, specifically Van Jones (incoming Deputy Chief of Staff) recommended (rather perfusely) that O'Malley remove the promise from the speech, but O'Malley stood firm. He reportedly told a group of his speechwriters: "If I mean it, I'll say it. I'll only say it if I mean it. The American people deserve an honest, contrite man in the White House. That's what we'll give them." First Term (2017-2021) 2017 The first full-day of business for the O'Malley administration was Saturday, January 21. Following-up on his campaign pledge to get to work "on day one", O'Malley and his closest advisers - many of them veterans of the campaign - got to work filling immediate presidential appointments. In this first-day meeting, it is reported that the organization for the White House Senior Staff was first decided: Valerie Jarrett as Chief of Staff; Van Jones as Deputy Chief of Staff; Stephanie Cutter as Director of Communications; Jon Favreau as Deputy Director of Communications; Anthony Brown as Senior Counselor; Jen Psaki as Press Secretary; and Anne-Marie Slaughter as National Security Adviser. These top positions were mainly decided by President O'Malley, his longtime friend and adviser John Griffin, and Vice President Rahm Emanuel, the former Mayor of Chicago, Illinois. In Emanuel's memoirs, he wrote: "the decisions were made by Martin; I just listened. He wanted the campaign apparatus to mature into the group running the country. That first day was likely the toughest and most stressful day of Martin's life up to that point. He wanted to make the right decision with every decision; something, I told him, that was simply unachievable. But he sure did try." By noon, the president and his staff had prepared a nine-page "proposal paper", filled with presidential nominees whose confirmations depended on the Senate. Jon Favreau, the youngest of the bunch, was directed to personally deliver the paper to Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer for review. Within hours, Senator Schumer's office returned the paper to the White House with a personal note from the Senator at the bottom: "We will get it done." By February 1, the Senate had confirmed the entire White House Senior Staff and O'Malley's Cabinet - all but Attorney General. Fulfilling another major campaign pledge, O'Malley set out to submit to Congress a deficit reduction plan by the end of February, 2017. In doing so, he met with his newly-established economic team, including Raj Chetty as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers and Peter Orszag as Secretary of the Treasury. With his team, they formulated a tax, spending, and entitlement reform plan that would "eliminate the deficit within a decade." The president's panel of economists (which he called the "nerds who run the world") were unanimous in their support for the package: the Deficit Reduction and Economic Mobility Act of 2017. The bill, which was finalized, written, and sent to Congress on February 18, was the O'Malley administration's first legislative proposal. At first glance, it was a godsend for liberal Democrats: a minimum wage increase, stimulus spending on infrastructure projects and clean energy, the closing of tax loopholes for corporations, and student loan reform. But once the Congressional committees got ahold of the legislation, the language sent Democrats into chaos and disbelief. "Arbitrary, unethical, and downright stupid," is what Senator Elizabeth Warren called the bill, as debate heated up near the end of February. Democrats were enraged by the large spending cuts included in the bill, especially for "vital" services for the underpriveledged, including food stamps, heating assistance, and government subsidized cellular phones. In response to the party's outrage, the White House noted the Congressional Budget Office's cost-benefit analysis of the bill, including its estimate of "steep, massive reductions in poverty and unemployment, as well as drastic deficit reduction that will help the economy over the long-term." Despite the administration and moderate Republicans backing the deficit reduction bill, O'Malley failed to convince Democrats to support his plan. On March 2, Majority Leader Schumer sent the White House a memo that spoke to the heart of Congress's attitude toward the bill. It read that Democrats simply could not support a law that "guts Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security; increases fees and taxes on America's working poor and middle-class; and effectively puts into place a budget reminiscent of Republican budgets of the past." After reading the memo, the president became irritated and sent Van Jones and Xavier Briggs (Director of the Office of Management and Budget) to Capitol Hill in the hope of negotiating a compromise. After three days of committee meetings and congressional debate, a compromi se erected in the House of Representatives - largely due to the work of Rep. André Carson, D-IN. This compromise bill still managed to achieve a balanced budget in ten years, but its cuts to social safety net programs were much less dramatic. Instead, the House plan incuded deeper cuts in defense spending, agriculture subsidies, and federal retirement benefits. It also raised the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $11 an hour, phased-in over three years (the president's plan raised it to $10.50 over four years), and all but eliminated from the federal budget tax credits and deductions for "Big Oil" corporations. Stimulus funds were allocated in the bill for clean energy projects and infrastrucutre modernization, while both cigarette and gasoline taxes were increased significantly. The plan passed the House on March 5, with a vote of 274-161, with all Democrats and two Republicans voting for the measure. It was sent to the Senate the same day and was passed along party lines, 56-44, on March 10. The passage of the deficit reduction plan was a huge accomplishment for the young O'Malley administration, and the public gave the majority of the credit to O'Malley himself, despite the fact that his proposal had died in committee. Following the passage of the Economic Stimulus and Fiscal Responsibility Act (ESFRA), O'Malley's approval rating elevated to 59%, his highest level of approval up to that point. On April 7, President O'Malley - along with Vice President Rahm Emanuel, Chief of Staff Valerie Jarrett, Deputy Director of Communications Jon Favreau, White House Senior Counselor Anthony Brown, New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio, and California Attorney General Kamala Harris - took a trip to Camp David to discuss the ongoing challenge of filling the Cabinet post of Attorney General. According to annonymous sources who attended the meetings, the President aggresively pushed the idea of re-nominating Eric Holder at the post, but his advisers were unanimous in their opposition. They charged, according to the sources, that the Department of Justice was in need of a chief who would more closely mirror the convictions of the administration. For example, a constant campaign pledge made by the O'Malley camp was "War on Poverty" reform. O'Malley had also been an outspoken critic of the Obama administration's warrantless wiretapping of telephone calls within the United States and the drone killing of an American citizen that ocurred under Holder's watch. The vice president was especially adamant about a change at Justice. In listening to the arguments, the president called an April 9 press conference at which he publicly nominated Kamala Harris to the AG post. Vice President Emanuel wrote in his memoirs that Harris initially declined, citing her plans to run for Governor of California in 2018. However, the President allegedly reminded her that she would be - arguably - the most attractive, experienced Democratic frontrunner to suceed him for the Presidency; she accepted "without delay". After the announcement, President O'Malley held his fourth televised press conference, staying true to his transition-era pledge to hold a Q&A with the press at least once a month as president. In the conference, he claimed victory for the budget bill and the growing economy, and also layed out his vision for the administration's immediate upcoming agenda item: his first foreign trip. After three weeks of preparation, President O'Malley departed the U.S. for the first foreign trip of his presidency. Continuing a longstanding American Presidential tradition, his first trip was to Canada to meet with newly-elected Prime Minister Jean Charest, an influencial leader of the Liberal Party and a good friend of Vice President Rahm Emanuel. Due to this, Emanuel - as well as Secretary of State Jon Huntsman - accompanied O'Malley on the trip. Scarcely covered by the press due to the ongoing Congressional gridlock over a Pentagon oversight bill, the foreign trip went "exceptionally well" according to the President and the Prime Minister. On the final day of the three-day visit, President O'Malley gave a forty-two minute speech about foreign affairs at the University of Toronto to a crowd of well over 19,000. After departing from Toronto, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki quoted sound-bites from the president's speech to foreshadow the administration's first move on foreign affairs since taking office three months prior. On April 17, the president's first full-day back in Washington, he signed his first executive order: Executive Order 10320. This action effectively ended the United States' military occupation of Germany, Norway, Greenland, and Spain for the first time since before World War II. Citing a military and budgetary inconvinience for the United States as well as the other nations involved, President O'Malley announced his plan to reduce, and eventually eliminate, America's military involvement in those countries. 10320 was met with both fierce opposition as well as enthusiasm from members of Congress, world leaders, and the American public. In his address, the president said he "promised all along a change in policy and this is what I have enacted." Ray Mabus, O'Malley's Secretary of Defense, released a statement in support of the president's plan for U.S. troop deployment. O'Malley's approval with the American people saw no significant effect as a result of his executive order. Throughout his reelection campaign, however, Democratic and Republican opponents alike challenged the president repeatedly on this issue. The next day, on April 18, Kamala Harris was confirmed by the Senate unanimously as Attorney General. The remainder of April and May saw a partisan battle over spending levels for the next fiscal year. Democrats in the House and Senate proposed increased federal investment in infrastructure spending and early childhood education, while Congressional Republicans sought deep cuts in social safety programs like Head Start, SNAP, and unemployment insurance. Both sides agreed that taxes should not be raised in the upcoming budget, but there was also consensus that in order to close the budget gap, additional revenues were necessary. As a result, two bills emerged and were sent to the opposing chambers. The first, the House of Representatives' 2018-2019 federal budget proposal, was passed on June 1, and sent to the Senate the following day. The House plan included three key provisions: a 4% capital gains tax increase, first affecting incomes of more than $1 million and gradually phased-in to affect the remaining taxpayers; an adoption of the Chained Consumer Price Index, an alternate form of measuring cost-of-living adjustments for social safety net programs and federal tax brackets; and the elimination of the Children's Health Insurance Program, replacing it with government-assisted health insurance coverage for poor and middle-class families and their children. The second plan, the Senate's ten-year budget plan, was passed on June 3, and sent to the House the same day. Its key components included: the continuation of the ten-year spending levels agreed upon by the Economic Stimulus and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which balanced the budget in ten years and was approved and signed into law three months prior; deeper cuts in the Department of Defense and the Department of the Interior, including the cancellation of some military projects and the consolidation of several bureaus within DOI; and the elimination of the payroll tax cap on incomes above $113,700, which meant the highest income earners would be taxed at the same rate as lower- and middle-income earners to fund Social Security. Those two bills, while wide in scope and far from similar, both would dramatically reduce the federal budget deficit and achieve a balanced budget by Fiscal Year 2029. Initially, Treasury Secretary Peter Orszag recommended the White House sponser the Senate bill, which more closely mirrored the administration's fiscal policies. However, the President decided to hold off on a promotion and instead allowed Congress to continue debate. On June 22, the House made minor modifications to the Senate's bill and passed it with wide bipartisan support (330-105). President O'Malley signed SB 6143 on the morning of June 25, 2017, celebrating yet another legislative victory for his young administration. Almost instantly, O'Malley's public approval jumped from 56-66%, signaling a growing trust by the public in their new leader. On June 18, President O'Malley spoke confidentially with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani by telephone from the Oval Office. In their nine-minute discussion, they laid the necessary framework for a negotiation conference between delegates of the two nations on the issues of sanctions and nuclear proliferation. Anne-Marie Slaughter, President O'Malley's National Security Adviser, suggested to the President the idea of him traveling to Tehran himself. At first, he loathed the idea, believing it to be a show of weakness and that it would present the image of the President of the United States "begging for peace". By Wednesday, June 21, the President had changed his mind; he quickly convened his national security team - headed by Slaughter - and assembled a strategy session in the Situation Room. After speaking with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Secretaries of Defense, State, and Treasury, the Vice President, and his national security advisers, the administration released a public request of Rouhani to meet for a conference on September 4 in Oslo, Norway. Submitting this "neutral" location of Oslo, the U.S. successfully avoided the appearance of a scenario in which the President weakened his bargaining leverage. The stated goals of the conference, chiefly authored by Slaughter, were to: "Peacefully negotiate a permanent settlement on the issues of economic and noneconomic international sanctions, nuclear development, enrichment, and utilization; earn reassurance and verification that the Islamic Republic of Iran does not and does not plan to sponsor by the state any form of hate, violence, or otherwise terroristic organization; and discuss seriously the differences in opinion on international relations between the two nations in the hopes of gradually returning to a state of diplomatic normalcy." Within hours of the request, Washington received a positive response from President Rouhani's office. In the memo sent back to the White House, the words from Rouhani read: "You shall count on our full involvement and participation." With the response, the State Department, Defense Department, and National Security Agency began scrambling to begin work on the September conference. Coined by Jen Psaki, it began to be informally referred-to as the Oslo Conference. President O'Malley, in a July 3 Press Conference, called the diplomatic mission a "once-in-a-lifetime attempt at peace." Hopes were running high. During the lead-up to the Oslo Conference, O'Malley signed two significant domestic legislative packages. The first, signed on July 25, was a bill that increased military retirees' pensions by 1%, effectively returning them to the rate at which they stood before the budget cuts of 2013. As a way to temporarily reduce the budget deficit, President Barack Obama and his respective Congress had passed a budget package that reduced benefits to future military retirees; with the signing of the Military Respect and Fairness Act, President O'Malley restored the benefits to their prior levels. The second domestic bill was the Fair Credit Reporting Act of 2017, a bill sponsored by Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachussets that outlawed the practice of employers requesting prospective employees' credit reports as a requirement for employment, effective January 1, 2018. The bill was first introduced in December 2013, but died in committee. It resurfaced during O'Malley's transition period, during which he promised to support and sign the bill if it passed both the House and the Senate. After passing with strong bipartisan support, O'Malley signed the bill into law on August 10. After an entire summer of preparation, the Oslo Conference was thoroughly strategized. The delegation was made public on August 24; those attending Oslo would be: President Martin O'Malley; White House Chief of Staff Valerie Jarrett; Secretary of State Jon Huntsman; Secretary of Defense Ray Mabus; National Security Adviser Anne-Marie Slaughter; nuclear weapons experts Joseph Cirincione, Erin Mahan, and Kathleen Vogel; Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and later Secretary of Defense Robert Menendez; and nine other low-level State Department officials. They were tasked with the daunting burden of presenting the United States' case for peace in a region historically known for violence and unrest. They departed the U.S. in the early morning hours of September 2 and arrived later that day. The conference began on the morning of September 4. With both U.S. and Iranian officials meeting in diplomatic fashion, the cordial meetings were held to a minimum and the policy discussions were underway by the end of the first day. Vice President Rahm Emanuel wrote in his memoirs that following the first day of the conference, he received a phone call from President O'Malley. In the memoirs, he wrote: "...he told me it was the toughest time of his life. The Iranians said were fierce, cold-hearted, and relentlessly patriotic." Interestingly, not much was made public about the inner-details of the conference. What is known, however, is that Secretary Huntsman and Anne-Marie Slaughter took charge of major negotiations from the start. Menendez later told the press, "The President sat-in on every high-level meeting, but the main players in Oslo were unquestionably Huntsman and Slaughter," This came as no surprise to administration officials or political pundits; O'Malley's lack of foreign policy experience was a burdening liability during his campaign for the presidency. During the Democratic primaries, when battling Senators Menendez and Jack Reed for the nomination, he was endlessly attacked for his "ignorance" and "incompetence" on the world stage. After the 2016 election, O'Malley offered Senator Reed a spot in his administration - specifically as Defense Secretary or Director of the CIA - but he flatly declined. The conference and its members remained quiet until the evening of September 8, when the President announced he would be returning to the United States to oversee the several wildfires that had engulfed northern California and parts of southern Oregon. He arrived that evening and immediately landed on the ground in California. While O'Malley met with the two governors and first responders who were managing the natural disaster, his foreign policy team remained in Oslo to work out the details of the U.S.-Iran agreement. On the morning of September 9, O'Malley federalized the California national guard to manage the wildfires more rigidly. They stopped the spread of the fires the following day and continued to treat them throughout the week. On September 10, Secretary Huntsman notified the President that a deal had been reached and recommended he return to Oslo to finalize the accord. It was not made public that a deal had been struck, but the White House announced the President would return to "supervise negotiations". The next day, alongside their chief foreign policy advisers, O'Malley and Rouhani shook hands for a photo and dually signed the binding agreement. On the morning of September 12, the respective teams departed from Oslo, Norway and returned home to their nations. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki announced that afternoon that the President would be speaking to the nation from the Oval Office at 9pm that evening - it was to be his first Oval Office address as President of the United States. In his speech to the nation, O'Malley spoke first of broad, familiar topics such as the rich, troubling history of the two countries and his hope and optimism for a future of peace and cooperation. He then released the details of the deal. They were to include: the gradual reduction and eventual lifting of all economic sanctions imposed by the United States against the Islamic Republic of Iran, beginning January 1, 2018 and phased-in over ten years; the deployment of 3,000 United Nations peacekeeping troops and nuclear inspectors to oversee and verify the destruction of all chemical and biological weapons as well as the utilization of peaceful, energy-exclusive nuclear materials; the deployment of 5,000 U.S. troops to Iran for the purpose of "peacekeeping and international enforcement", beginning on January 1; and the destruction of 85% of Iran's nuclear reactors, no later than December 31, 2022 (U.S. negotiators pushed for 100% destruction, but the Iranians called such goal "unachievable"). The international agreement also included a clause that stated, "no later than sixty days following the adjournment of this conference, the United States of America shall appoint a formal Ambassador to Iran, whom shall report directly to the Secretary of State, whom reports directly to the President of the United States of America. Such Ambassador shall be allocated such budgetary limitations deemed necessary by the President and shall find employment at the herein established United States Embassy of Iran. Furthermore, upon the same time, the Islamic Republic of Iran shall appoint a formal Ambassador to the United States of America..." Minutes following President O'Malley's Oval Office speech, he released a statement formally appointing Anne-Marie Slaughter as Ambassador to Iran, a post that had been disbanded for the last 38 years. He congratulated her on the dedication and diplomacy she showcased in Oslo and presented his full support in her endeavors. The following morning, President Rouhani announced his appointment of First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri as Ambassador to the United States. The Oslo conference was the greatest presentation of peaceful diplomacy between the U.S. and Iran since the hostage crisis of the 1970s. On December 10, 2017, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to all main players in the Oslo Conferece - Presidents O'Malley and Rouhani, Ambassadors Slaughter and Jahangiri, Secretaries Huntsman and Mabus, Joseph Cirincione, Erin Mahan, Kathleen Vogel, and Senator Robert Menendez. The Senate confirmed Slaughter as Ambassador to Iran unanimously on October 3. The international implications of the "Oslo Compromise" may have been great, but it also provided a political honeymoon for the administration. The President enjoyed a high approval rating of 67% directly after the negotiations, allowing for his first formal vacation while in the presidency. On September 22 until the 28, the O'Malleys spent a week out-of-the-radar, vacationing as a family at the Outer Banks in North Carolina. While away, Vice President Rahm Emanuel remained in Washington, advocating for the passage of a sweeping gun control measure he helped author. Xavier Becerra, the Democratic Speaker of the House of Representatives, promised Emanuel a vote on the bill once Congress returned to session on October 2. Meanwhile, while Congress was out of town, the Vice President hosted the 2017 Super Bowl Champion Cleveland Browns at the White House. On September 26, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court Ruth Bader Ginsburg died at her home of natural causes; she was 84 years old. When President O'Malley returned from his short vacation at the Outer Banks, he met with his chief advisers on the nomination of a new Supreme Court Justice. O'Malley had returned to the White House with a shortlist of nominees. Among them: Sri Srinivasan and Patricia Ann Millett (both judges of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit); Cheri Beasley (Associate Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court); Robert Post (Dean of Yale Law School); and Kamala Harris (United States Attorney General). Almost immediately after presenting his short list, Valerie Jarrett ruled out the nomination of Post, citing his age (then 69). "We need a young, liberal justice on the court," said Jarrett. "Post may have the right ideology, but we need a justice that will outlast our administration and our legacy." The President concurred. Jarrett also found the nomination of Kamala Harris troubling. She felt that Harris lacked the necessary judicial experience for an Associate Justice. At the adjournment of the White House meeting, O'Malley tasked Jarrett and Deputy Chief of Staff Van Jones with finding an appropriate nominee within five days. Later that day, he - along with twelve world leaders, the eight living Supreme Court justices, four Cabinet officials, and his family - attended Justice Ginsburg's funeral in her hometown of Brooklyn, New York. When O'Malley's team returned to him with recommendations, he struck them down and introduced his own. He proposed nominating his Attorney General, Kamala Harris, to the Supreme Court and replacing her with Tony West, the current White House Counsel. Again, Jarrett made noticeable her apprehension. Jones, on the other hand, was enthusiastic of the President's proposal. O'Malley then decided to spread the idea throughout the rest of the senior staff. By the end of the day on September 30, O'Malley's plan had the support of the majority of his advisers. He decided to give the decision a few days for thinking over. On the morning of October 2, Congress' first day back in session, he sent his nomination to the Supreme Court: United States Attorney General Kamala Harris. The nomination was grueling. The Senate Judiciary Committee - similarly to White House Chief of Staff Valerie Jarrett - questioned Harris' lack of experience. They also found discomfort with her opposition to the death penalty - the chairman of the committee, Sheldon Whitehouse, was a strong proponent of federal capital punishment. Nevertheless, the Senate quickly confirmed Harris' nomination by a vote of 60-37 on the morning of October 10. She would be the first African-American female on the Supreme Court. Category:Browse